Many of us from the subregion of southern Africa never expected to witness the end of apartheid and the opening up of the floodgates of freedom in South Africa so soon. The words of Mr. Mandela in his address to the Special Committee against Apartheid in September, when he said
"The date for the de…
We wish to pay a special tribute to the Department of Humanitarian Affairs and all organs of the United Nations system for a job well done in providing a coordinated response to the drought emergency situation in southern Africa. Botswana is one of the countries gripped by the drought that has been …
By now, we all know that the problem of the illicit production, sale, demand and distribution of narcotics and psychotropic substances has been with us for a very, very long time. The nations of the world have individually, regionally and internationally tried to grapple with this problem, with vary…
The past two years brought high
expectations that the South African situation was finally developing for the
better, but recent developments, particularly the issues of violence and the
impasse in the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) talks, have
dampened our hopes. Our expectati…
The draft resolution before us is totally
devoid of any indication, nay any certainty, that what we will do tonight
exclude Yugoslavia from the work of the forty-seventh session of the General
Assembly - will contribute in any way to a solution to the tragic situation in
Bosnia and Herzegovina. …
On 13 July 1983 the South African Broadcasting Corporation broadcast an essay on constitutional development, part of which reads: "Evading reality, building constitutions to ideological constructs, is a prescription for disaster". 2. It is common knowledge that early this month, on 2 November to be …
In his address to the General Assembly on 30 September 1982 my Foreign Minister stated that
U ••• after 300 years, the black majority of the South African society remain aliens in their fatherland. The creation for them of overcrowded, over-grazed and generally denuded so-called homelands, the deni…
The delegation of Botswana reserves its position on operative paragraphs 31 and 34 of draft resolution A/36/L.23/Rev.l. 'Ve also wish t\> reserve our position on operative paragraph 1 of draft reso- lution A/36/L.25, in particular as regards those recommen- dations in the report of the United Nation…
The continued ap- pearance on the agenda of the sessions of the Assembly of the question of the Comorian island of Mayotte can only serve to remind us that the Islamic Federal Republic of the Comoros is not fully independent, because part of it is. still colonized. Nothing can hide this fact. No amo…
I have the honour to speak on this item in my capacity as chairman of the group of African States for the month.
56. Let me begin by reaffirming Africa's unequivocal commitment to and faith in the purposes and principles of the United Nations, as enshrined in its Charter.
57. Co-operation between …
My delegation, for reasons well known, reserves its position on operative paragraph I of draft resolution A/36/L.39 and Add. I, in so far as it refers to the Paris Declaration on Sanctions against South Africa. We also reserve our position on op- erative paragraphs 6 and 11 of draft resolution A/36/…
In normal circum- stances this debate would have been considered ill-timed and unnecessary. It would have been passible to persuade us to be patient, to allow the five Western States to re- suscitate their three-year-old initiative and to sell their proposals to the front-line States and the United …
The past three years have seen what some of us had thought was a positive movement forward in the negotiations for Namibian independence. Unfortunately, as we meet here today Namibia remains unliberated; its people are caught up in a vicious "catch 22" situation. They have become the constant subjec…
For reasons which are well known to all members of the Assembly, my delegation would like to register its abstentions on operative paragraph 6 of draft resolution A/35/ L.I3 and Add.l, operative paragraphs 2 (b) and (d) of draft resolution A/35/L.17 and Add.1 and operative paragraph 1 (d) of draft r…
Let me suggest at the outset that there is no need for us to go back into the far reaches of antiquity in the history of the Middle East to understand why that troubled area has expe-
borders. By force of arms it has conquered and oc- cupied one Arab territory after another; and to add arrogance to…
During the months of July and August of this year, the front-line States and the five Western States of the contact group successfully negotiated on all the issues that had been blocking progress towards implementation of Secu- rity Council resolution 435 (1978). In August, we in- formed the world t…
Mr. President, it gives me personally, and th~ enti~e Botswana delega- tion, great pleasure an~ sahsfactlO~ that you, a. rep- resentative of the Umted RepublIc of Tanzania, a country with which Botswana has .the most cordi~ of relations have been elected PreSident of the thlrty- fourth se~sion of th…
Today more than ever before, our region, southern Africa, is in a state of ex- treme tension and insecurity. Our skies are overcast with the threatening clouds of war. The racists and op- pressors of our pe~le in that region are constantly beating the drums of war and perfecting the instruments of o…
The fact that the General Assembly is meeting in resumed session, an uncommon practice in the annals of this body, clearly demonstrates that we have reached a crisis-point, an impasse in fact, in so far as the decolonization of Namibia is concerned.
52. Equally, the fact that we have met in resumed…
